Rally and Obedience

Kennel Club Rally is still quite new in the UK. Little Orchard offers 2 Rally Courses - at "Starters" and "Intermediate" level.

Rally came to the UK having been popular and well established in America for a number of years. Sarah and Alex have been competing with their dogs and enjoying the training involved with Rally and this has led to Little Orchard becoming more involved with the sport.

What is Rally?

Rally involves negotiating a Course made up of signs. Each sign represents a manoeuvre or exercise that must be completed by the dog and handler. Each handler starts with a Perfect Score of 200 (excluding the Bonus) and as you work around the Course, points are deducted for various things.
A lot of the positions and skills needed for Rally are introduced during the Kennel Club Good Citizen training . Completing the KC Silver Award will give you a good start in Rally.

How big is a Rally Course?

There are a number of Levels in Rally but everyone starts in Level 1. At Level 1 there are 15 signs making up the Course plus a Bonus.
As the level increases, the number of signs increases along with the difficulty of the tasks required.

What do our Courses Cover?

We now offer three levels of Courses.
Our "Starter" level Course is 8 weeks long and focuses on Levels 1 & 2. We introduce the idea of Rally and have a go at the basic signs.
Our "Intermediate" level Course is 10 weeks long and focuses on the level 3 & 4 signs, alongside training level 1 & 2 courses and also learning about scoring and judging courses.
We then have "Rally Club" which is an ongoing competition club with classes every week. This covers all levels of signs as well as judging and stewarding.

Some of the tasks we teach on both courses include:

Focus work

Expanding clicker training skills

Working as a dog and handler team to train and problem solve

Loose lead walking

Waits and recalling

Teaching the heel position

How to teach the signs for the appropriate level

Have a look at the Kennel Club produced information leaflet "Why not try Rally" by CLIKING HERE

At Little Orchard we are fortunate to have 7 of the training team that have passed their Kennel Club Rally Judges examinations.

For more information about the rules and regulations around Rally, see the Kennel Club website by CLICKING HERE .

This is some of the feedback we've had about Rally:

"Meg and I have just started the Rally course at Little Orchard, it’s a great way to really connect with your dog. By working closely with Meg on each of the Rally exercises I’ve found that it has really helped steady her. It has definitely made me think carefully about how we communicate but most of all it’s a great way to have fun with training and put into practise all the things we have learnt so far.”

‘Rally training is fun and thoroughly enjoyable for both me and my dog. It can also be challenging, but in a good way, as there is a lot to think about when starting out for both dog and handler! It involves training your dog to complete a course consisting of numbered signs with specific exercises for your dog to do at each sign, before moving on to the next one. You complete the course with your dog on a loose lead and the exercises includes various turns while walking to heel, and combinations of the basic commands such as ‘sit-down-sit’ etc. It is a great course for anyone, regardless of whether you wish to compete or not, as it reinforces all the basic commands and heel work, as well as giving you the opportunity to continue training and working with your dog in an interesting and enjoyable way."